ESPN Chicago is reporting that there was some miscommunication between Bulls front office and Vinny Del Negro in the Bulls loss to the Nets on Friday. Essentially, there had been a decision to not play Joakim Noah more than 35 minutes. Noah hit that limit, and so Vinny Del Negro pulled him. Then apparently player development assistant Lindsey Hunter asked acting General Manager Gar Forman if they could go over, Forman checked with VP John Paxson, who gave the okay.

But by that point they were in overtime. And VDN didn’t think the approval meant he could push Noah for the entire period. Noah played just 12 seconds in overtime.

Okay. Couple things here.

One, Gar Forman notifying the press that Lindsey Hunter had asked and they’d approved? That’s some Grade A buck-passing and bus throwing. There’s no reason to inform the press that. Just say that it was VDN’s decision and direct all questions to the coaching staff. They don’t need to know that they need your approval to play a player more minutes. And wait, the assistant coach has to go ask the general manager, who then has to go ask the former GM and VP? How does that work, exactly? For a decision that needs to be made in about thirty seconds?

So the coach doesn’t have power to make final call on minutes. The GM doesn’t have the power to authorize the coach on that call. And an assistant is going to the GM to ask.

Weird. Just weird.

There’s rampant speculation that VDN is going to be gone after this season, despite leading the Bulls to back to back playoff appearances with a shell of a roster, rampant injuries, and this silliness in the front office. VDN’s not a great coach. He may not even be a good coach. But he’s improved, and he’s gotten results. It’s a shame that he was set up to fail so incredibly by the team.

Tom Benson, the now 90-year-old owner of the New Orleans Pelicans and the NFL’s Saints, a few years back changed around the succession of control of the team after his passing — his wife Gayle will take control. Rita Benson LeBlanc, Benson’s granddaughter and former handpicked successor, sued saying Benson had been manipulated. After meeting privately with Benson, a judge ruled that while Benson suffered some “cognitive impairment” he was capable of making his own decisions and that Gayle remained the successor.

Benson has been sued multiple times since then, including by former Saints employee Rodney Henry, and the then-89-year-old Benson was deposed in that case last year.

During another set of questions, apparently aimed at establishing how close Benson and Henry had been, Benson was shown a photo of the two men with Pelicans star Anthony Davis.

“Who is this?” Williams asked.

“It’s Rodney and a basketball player,” Benson said. “Oh, hell, I forget his name. Let me — he’s a great player for us. Tell me his name, and I will tell you yes or no.”

When asked “is it Anthony Davis,” Benson said yes. The man is 90, I’m not sure that we should expect much. He had the foresight to bring in people to run his businesses — including his sports teams — and set up a line of succession for when he does pass. Smart moves.

Would Benson’s mental state impact potential changes coming to the Pelicans? Probably not. New Orleans’ GM Dell Demps bet big on going big in a league trending smaller, pairing Davis and DeMarcus Cousins. If that doesn’t work out, plenty of people around the league expect a house cleaning on the basketball side with the Pelicans. Benson’s mental state, whatever it may be, does not impact that.

The deposition leak came from an anonymous source (and anonymous email account, the paper verified the document before publishing). Who leaked it? It may be nearly impossible to find out, but only one side benefits from all this becoming public. And it’s not Benson.

A few years back in Philadelphia, the athletic K.J. McDaniels was a highlight factory and looked like a guy who could develop into a role player on the wing in the NBA.

Except, he never actually developed. Houston gave him a chance (three years at a total of $10 million), and it didn’t work out, then last season Brooklyn had him for 20 games, but they decided to move on.

Now Toronto is going to give him a chance, reports Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN.

McDaniels’ agent later confirmed the news. This is a training camp, make-good contract for McDaniels. But unlike a lot of those contracts being handed out around this time, there is space on the Raptors roster for a player or two.

Before the KJ McDaniels partial, Toronto had $116.6M in guaranteed salary with 13 players + the $100K partial of Alfonzo McKinnie.

McDaniels will compete with Alfonzo McKinnie, Kennedy Meeks, and Kyle Wiltjer for one of the final roster spots in Toronto. Of that group, I’d most likely want to keep McDaniels because of the shot blocking and his potential — but his outside shot has to improve.

The Raptors can carry 15 on the roster and very possibly will until at least Jan. 10, which is the date these partially guaranteed deals become fully guaranteed for the season. Toronto is flirting with the tax line, and ownership is not going to want to pay the tax for this team, so if they do carry 15 they likely will cut it to 14 by that date.

The #DriveByDunkChallenge has been a fun distraction this summer. If you don’t know what it is, it essentially involves NBA players jumping out of their cars to dunk on regular folks on community basketball hoops.

There are still some serious doubts about whether the Celtics will be able to unseat the Cleveland Cavaliers in the Eastern Conference, but perhaps they won’t need to wait for long. Rumors are starting to trickle in about LeBron James leaving Ohio, so maybe by the time we are used to seeing Hayward in Celtics green next season they will have less competition out east.